Solutions
by liebedance
Summary: Nothing upsets Sirius quite like his mother does. And nobody - nobody - wants to be around an upset Sirius. R/R


[A/N: written for my sister (flameintheflood) because she was having a bad day and I wanted to cheer her up

I don't own Harry Potter]

* * *

"She. Is. Fucking. Insane." Sirius growled, punctuating each word with a rip of the parchment into halves, quarters, eighths, and then sixteenths. He threw the bits into the fire and watched as they were devoured by flame. "I hate her sometimes, I really do."

"What's she done now?" James asked quietly. Even after four years of being Sirius' roommate and best friend, this dark, angry side of Sirius still surprised – and even scared – James sometimes. He was used to the jovial Sirius – the one who laughed and pranked Slytherins with him and snuck down to the kitchens after hours. This Sirius – the one that always appeared after school breaks or owls from home – reminded James of how he'd been the first few weeks of first year, before he'd realised that his dorm mates couldn't care less about surnames.

"I can't believe her," Sirius snarled. "She is definitely not sane. She's for sure lost it this time. I swear, if St Mungo's got hold of her, they'd-"

"What's she done?" James asked again, cutting Sirius off.

Sirius didn't answer; he just stared into the fire at the ashes of what had once been expensive parchment.

It was a fine line James was treading, dealing with Sirius. There was a danger threshold that was hard to identify until you crossed it, and by then a large amount of broken items littered the room. But James had experience in these matters. After four years, James knew when and how to push Sirius to talk and when it was best to let him seethe silently. At least, knew better than Remus or Peter, both of whom had hurried to the library at first glance of the Black family seal.

"My _mother_," Sirius answered after several moments, "wants me to switch Houses."

"Er… is she aware that we've just started fifth year, not first?" James asked slowly, furrowing his eyebrows in confusion.

"I told you, she's completely bonkers," Sirius exclaimed, rising from his chair and up-ending it. "Her logic isn't logic… it's anti-logic. It's bloody ridiculous. And I'm sick of dealing with her shite."

"You do know that nobody can _force_ you to switch Houses," James said. "In fact, I don't think I've ever heard of anybody switching Houses ever. I doubt that you'd be allowed to."

"If there's a way, she'll find it," scoffed Sirius. "She apparently didn't like the way I behaved after being at your house this summer. Apparently you and your blood-traitor parents and our half-blood friends are a bad influence. Apparently I'd be in better company with Mulciber and Avery and Snivellus. Apparently I ought to be more like Regulus, the _true_ Black, the "always pure" one. _Toujours_ _pur_ my ass. "

"But, none of this is new," James tried. "It's not like you haven't heard all this shite before."

"That's exactly the bloody problem!" Sirius insisted, his already loud voice raising further in volume. "I'm so bloody sick of it. I can't deal with it any longer. I can't even _think_ about going home at Christmas. James, I can't do it!"

Sirius sunk down into to couch beside James and put his head in his hands. Several more minutes passed where the only sounds that could be heard were the crackling of the fire and Sirius' angry breathing.

"Maybe you don't have to," James suggested suddenly. "You can just come home with me for the Holidays. My mum and dad won't mind. Tell your parents that you're staying here to think about your House allegiances or some bullocks like that. It will be brilliant, like this summer but with hot chocolate and presents!"

"Maybe," Sirius said, looking up at his friend, his voice less tense and more hopeful. "That might work. And, if not, maybe the fact that I lied to her will push her over the edge completely and she'll be forced into St Mungo's."

"We can always hope," James retorted. He stood up and smiled broadly at his best friend. "Now, come on. In all your brooding and anger you missed dinner. Let's grab my cloak and go to the kitchens."

"And maybe hex some Slytherins, too, if we run into them?" Sirius asked hopefully.

"Whatever you want," James laughed. "We can even go out of our way to find them."

As Sirius stood up and started towards the stairs up to their dormitory, James glanced one last time at the fire and the turned-over chair. Not for the first time he wished that Sirius really were a Potter. If he were, then James would have very few qualms about fully cursing the House of Black.


End file.
